Jump to content

The "I've seen The Rise of Skywalker" Thread


Lucas1138
 Share

Recommended Posts

 

This implies to me, at least, that in the short 30 years of its existence, the New Republic learned nothing from the fall of the Old Republic and Palpatine seizing power, and fell back into the decadent state with a non-functional government that we saw in the Old Republic during the PT. Luke, Leia, and Anakin did not change a thing for the average person. This is what people mean by Luke's and Vader's efforts being nullified.

I get this. But perhaps that's the whole point. 30 years of peace and relative prosperity is all one can hope for? People never really learn from history. Greed and bureaucracy always return like a weed and peace only lasts so long.

 

The first order existing doesn't diminish a thing about the OT. Brining back Sidious was a cheap move I'll grant you that, but he's the best designed and created villain of all time, next to Vader. I don't know why they didn't have him be the main bad from the beginning of the ST... He's too good NOT to use. And trying to create an iconic villain intentionally falls flat on its face. You can't intentionally capture lightening in a bottle. Just look at Snoke. Even his name sucks

 

I see what you are saying, but come on man, this is JJ Abrams writing we are talking about. It isn't THAT deep. It's a detail JJ ignored altogether, which is why it is annoying. I guarantee you he didn't think a second about how bureaucracies corrupt absolutely. Had Sidious been the big bad from the get, I would agree with you. He IS an awesome villain, but if you watch the ST all the way through as one story, man is it disjointed and contradicts itself in ways not even the PT does not.

 

I didn't have a problem with the First Order at all, but yes, Snoke's name was dumb and we knew he was a stand in for the Emperor. The problem is, the reveal was he literally was a meat puppet controlled by the Emperor.

Ya'lls splitting hairs and by getting all nitty nerdy gritty with esoteric details. When ROTJ ended the good guys won, the Sith and The Empire were done.

 

As much as it pains me to admit it, the ST is guilty of everything I was ever mad at the EU for doing.

Well, whether intentionally or not, meaning either they straight up copied, or just came up with something similar on their own, they DID reuse a lot of concepts from the EU for the ST. I have to believe it's more than simple coincidence, though.

 

 

 

 

I don't buy this whole "invalidates" stuff. Or "raped my childhood" stuff for that matter.

If the OT was a fairytale where they all lived happily ever after, then I guess we could never have another Star Wars.

 

But yeah, I intensely dislike this shoehorned-in retcon that Palpatine was alive and pulling the strings all along. It's right next door to that "and then I woke up, it was all a dream" ending to the short story you wrote in sixth grade.

I don't think it invalidates it automatically. However the idea that someone said, maybe you, that evil cannot totally be defeated and every generation has to deal with it is a great idea. Its a great way to just keep telling Star Wars stories. In fact this idea is brought up in TLJ by Snoke "darkness rises and light to meet it." That premise could have been very interesting to explore going forward, problem is that its not.

 

That idea was the correct one-- the idea evil could return was fine in and of itself. The dark side will always exist. When TFA came out, I was okay with Kyo Ren, because it sounded like The Knights of Ren were some new sect of dark-siders-- which would have been a cheat, but acceptable. Snoke was a lame Emperor stand-in, but the idea they were something else kinda sorta worked.

 

That was undone.

 

Absolutely right. I like the idea of evil always returning, but not in the way we got. We were sold a bill of goods that the First Order, while born from the Empire, was a new threat. Kylo and Snoke were NOT Sith, initially. JJ even is on record saying a few years ago that Snoke was supposedly more powerful than the Emperor. I liked that idea. I had hoped Snoke was more of a rival to Palpatine, that seized power after he died. The Knights of Ren were implied to be something, but we never really found out what they were, exactly. They might as well have not used the Knights of Ren at all, and just had Snoke's imperial guard all along in their place. But what we got in the end was basically a Sith lord running the whole show, not a smart "cheat" as you put it, in the same way Chirrut Imwe was sort of an un-jedi.

 

I know a lot of people have said it before, but man I wish they had just set the ST a 100 years or more after ROTJ. Having Luke, Han, and Leia were all pointless for the ST movies, anyway. They could still have had Luke as a ghost from the beginning, maybe even Leia. They could have made Rey and Kylo distant and last surviving relatives of the Skywalker-Solo family. They could have even kept the familiar characters like the droids, Chewie, and the Falcon around. Even the Emperor could have been the big bad in the end, I guess. But had they set it further into the future, and made the OT events legendary as they tried to do, it would have worked much better IMHO. In short, they didn't go in with a concrete plan and they tried to both do something new and go for nostalgia by having the Big 3 involved. Ultimately, the Big 3ended up not doing much worthwhile in the films, and this is the result.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I still blame Rian Johnson for a lot of this. My anger toward TLJ all along was that he pissed all over TFA.

Now TLJ was mostly a well-made movie with some very good ideas, but Johnson killed Snoke, which was a cool surprise in a way, but clearly wasn't part of JJs idea of how this trilogy would go so when JJ came back in as director, with his plan to redeem Ben Solo, he needed his big bad and shoehorned in Palpatine (which, to me, is as bad a name as Snoke, you're all just used to it).

 

This is not a defence of ROS or it's creators, they should be creative enough to move on in any situation, but I'll throw them this bone: JJ set up a story with a lot of potential with TFA and then RJ just took an axe to a bunch of it. That's not what the second movie of a trilogy should do. Not every thread needs to be followed, but you do have to develop the story that was started.

 

Imagine the ROS we might have had if Snoke still lived to represent the ultimate evil; If Hux had not been reduced to a joke and could have developed as the un-super-powered fanatic rival to Kylo Ren; If Phasma had lived to be Finn's nemesis with this story of Stormtrooper revolt thrown on top of it. If Maz Kanatas mysticism had amounted to...anything at all. That could have been a movie I'd have wanted to see.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I had actually forgotten all about Phasma until you mentioned her. They did throw away what could've been a grand final battle between Phasma and her troops vs Finn leading his own army of ex-stormtrooper deserters. Finn comes full circle as the rest of the troops turn and Phasma is ultimately defeated. What a waste.

 

Ya'lls splitting hairs and by getting all nitty nerdy gritty with esoteric details. When ROTJ ended the good guys won, the Sith and The Empire were done.

As much as it pains me to admit it, the ST is guilty of everything I was ever mad at the EU for doing.

Someone once said, heck it might've been here where I read it, that the dirty little secret to SW is that the OT was a fairy tale. Nice, neat tightly told story with a happy ending. Thus, anything you try to add to the story, whether prequel or sequel or in between, will fall flat.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

They did throw away what could've been a grand final battle between Phasma and her troops vs Finn leading his own army of ex-stormtrooper deserters. Finn comes full circle as the rest of the troops turn and Phasma is ultimately defeated. What a waste..

And imagine Finn meets the deserters in Ep 8 and then his and whatsername's mission in 9 is to infiltrate and grow this revolt from within the First Order instead of, say, Lando conveniently showing up with a bunch of warships out of nowhere because, 'hey we need a space battle and we're too lazy to actually write something to explain it.'

Imagine the climax of the non-Reylo storyline being the First Order attacked from within. Hux's mad dreams falling apart in front of him as his own Star Destroyers are commandeered by mutineers TIE pilots attacking their own ships. Phasma, the ultimate Stormtrooper in final battle with Finn as he confronts all the demons of his past represented in her.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Someone once said, heck it might've been here where I read it, that the dirty little secret to SW is that the OT was a fairy tale. Nice, neat tightly told story with a happy ending. Thus, anything you try to add to the story, whether prequel or sequel or in between, will fall flat.

You could say the same thing about a lot of things that spawned great sequels/prequels. The Hobbit is the best example, it was nice, neat, tightly told and still launched the greatest story of the 20th century. It isn't impossible to do, you just can't be lazy.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Snoke sucked, killing him and making Kylo the main villain was a great idea and should have led to an interesting story. I fail to see how it's Johnson's fault that JJ evidently doesn't have the imagination or ability to tell a story without staying incredibly close to other things we've already seen in Star Wars.

 

Finn leading a storm trooper revolt should have been in IX. Having Phasma lead the loyal troopers against Finns rebelling ones would have been cool but it woulda been 95% as cool without Phasma anyway. I mean the idea plays out in Trevorrows script. Finn meets a couple troopers he knew from before he defected, they tell him others are inspired by him but are scared to act. Finn leads a revolt, they used the First Orders weapons against them, Hux kills himself when its obvious the battle is lost.

 

The whole end feels much more like disparate factions of the Galaxy rising up. You obviously have the Resistance itself, you do have Lando showing up with a fairly large fleet (although not near as large as in the actual movie), you have the rebelling storm troopers and you have the poor people of Coruscant rising up.

 

It's always strange to me when people say Rian kinda threw away certain things of what JJ was setting up, especially when it comes to Snoke. After watching TFA once I felt that Snoke was simply there for Kylo to kill and take his place. Obviously I wasn't thinking that to purposefully "undo" anything JJ set up. Its what I felt WAS set up during TFA. The whole idea of Kylo telling the Vader helmet he will finish what he started, the idea he wanted to be more powerful than Vader, when Han says Snoke is only using Kylo and you can see in Kylos face that even he understands the truth of it. I really felt the best way to go would be to have Kylo kill Snoke, in a scene that played out nearly exactly as I envisioned, and take his place as Supreme Leader. It never makes sense to me when people say that killing Snoke flies in the face of what TFA was trying to do because I think its the exact opposite. Its exactly the pay off to what TFA sets up.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Regarding the question of invalidation, had the PT not been made, the ST wouldn't have invalidated Luke's or Anakin's victories in any way. Luke saved his father and Anakin finally won his internal battle with the dark side. Both are personal victories, and neither is undone or diminished by Palpatine's return. But when the PT introduced the prophecy/chosen-one stuff, Anakin's actions at the end of ROTJ took on a greater significance. It wasn't just a personal victory anymore. He was bringing balance to the force, a gesture that is now empty given that Palpatine came right back.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Having Phasma lead the loyal troopers against Finns rebelling ones would have been cool but it woulda been 95% as cool without Phasma anyway.

I wouldn't say 95%. It can still work, but Phasma gives that side an avatar. The all-silver uniform makes her the symbolic representation of Stormtrooperdom. Whether you use this specific idea or not, it was there, set up in TFA - Finn was a Stormtrooper who defected and Phasma was his nemesis who wanted him dead. And RJ ignored Phasma for 80% of his movie then brought her in just to kill her off. If he didn't like the character, just leave her out of the movie. Why burn down the potential for anyone else to do something with her?

 

 

It's always strange to me when people say Rian kinda threw away certain things of what JJ was setting up, especially when it comes to Snoke. After watching TFA once I felt that Snoke was simply there for Kylo to kill and take his place.

Sure, that's fine if Kylo is to be the ultimate bad guy of the series, but what I said is if JJ's plan was to redeem Ben Solo, he needed a big bad. That's probably why he created Snoke (aka ersatz Palpatine). So when RJ kills him off, JJ needs a big bad again.

 

As many of us have also said, this all lies at Kathleen Kennedy's feet. If there was a planned arc for this trilogy, no director would be undoing major point points of the previous director's film.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Its not like Phasma has some cool role in TFA. She really doesn't do anything. At the end she is taken down in like a comic relief kinda way. During the attack on Maz's castle she isn't even there. When Finn fights a trooper 1 on 1 during that battle its not Phasma. I mean to say Rian ignored Phasma ignores the fact that JJ pretty much ignores here too. She has nothing even approaching an action scene in TFA. She does more in TLJ than TFA, even if her actions are all condensed to a sequence or two.

 

In reality you are making my point for me when you say JJ created a fake Emperor then when Rian killed him off JJ just brought back the original. It shows a lack of originality and imagination. I mean its almost like JJ thought "oh wow how can someone possibly make a Star Wars movie without an old guy sitting on a throne and without blowing up a planet???"

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Well yeah, I'm not trying to argue with you. It's obvious that's what Snoke was. He wasn't a brilliant or original character and Phasma didn't do much. It was the first movie. It was a set up. And rather than do what the writer/director of the second movie in a trilogy should do - develop the characters and the plot line. RJ figures he's smarter and more original than everyone so he tears it all to pieces.

 

Following that, JJ should be able to adapt better and be creative himself, but instead he showed that he wasn't pleased and acted like a petulant child with his movie. It's all so sad and KK should have been in better control of all of it.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I think if JJ had in mind that Snoke would be around the whole time and at the end Kylo would turn on him and redeem himself then RJ tried to do everyone a favor by removing that boring, rehashed possibility.

 

As for Phasma, Im not anti giving her a larger role going forward. However I do think that there are alot of characters at the end of TFA and Phasma was pretty far down on the list of them in terms of needing to be given a larger role in VIII. Could Johnson have used her somewhat earlier in the movie so its not liek she is on the shelf until 2/3 of the way through the movie when she shows up? Yeah sure. Should maybe he had kept her alive so whoever was making IX could have used her if they wanted? Probably so to be fair.

 

I just think Phasma is like realistically the 4th most important bad guy in TFA, its not often #4 villains get these large expanded roles going forward. I was on this board alot between TFA and TLJ and there was a lot of speculation about alot of characters. Im not sure I remember anyone ever really speculating about her going into it. No one really cared.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

JJ captured the right feel TFA, but it was so nostalgia driven it took no chances, and like all JJ movies, things are not earned. They are just handed to the characters.

 

RJ made bold and unexpected choices with TLJ, which the franchise needed. But he was so anti-nostalgia though that he drifted into too much of a DESTROY EVERYTHING mode, and on top of it, made a boring movie.

 

TROS is a nothing but studio notes based on a Reddit thread. Half of it is trying to undo or pay off what RJ did, a quarter of it is JJ playing Star Wars in his back yard, and a quarter of it is studio note nonsense that comes of as EU levels of silly poop.

 

As useless as it is to be prescriptive, the same way I think the PT should have been more standalone (ie, the Clone Wars had nothing to do with The Emperor taking power), so too should the ST have been.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

It's not like I'm some Capt Phasma fanboy, I just think there was a good way to use her as a foil for Finn's arc so Finn could actually have an arc instead of being the most hated character of fhe ST.

 

I know you liked TFA and I agree it had a lot of good ideas in it, it (mostly) looked great, but you've gotta admit that it fails when it comes to playing in the same sandbox as its predecessor. If you give that no importance, fine, but personally I think that's pretty important.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

JJ captured the right feel TFA, but it was so nostalgia driven it took no chances, and like all JJ movies, things are not earned. They are just handed to the characters.

 

RJ made bold and unexpected choices with TLJ, which the franchise needed. But he was so anti-nostalgia though that he drifted into too much of a DESTROY EVERYTHING mode, and on top of it, made a boring movie.

 

TROS is a nothing but studio notes based on a Reddit thread. Half of it is trying to undo or pay off what RJ did, a quarter of it is JJ playing Star Wars in his back yard, and a quarter of it is studio note nonsense that comes of as EU levels of silly poop.

 

As useless as it is to be prescriptive, the same way I think the PT should have been more standalone (ie, the Clone Wars had nothing to do with The Emperor taking power), so too should the ST have been.

You say he was anti-nostalgia but he has the single best use of nostalgia in the entire Disney era of movies when Artoo plays the "help me Obi Wan" message for Luke.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

It's not like I'm some Capt Phasma fanboy, I just think there was a good way to use her as a foil for Finn's arc so Finn could actually have an arc instead of being the most hated character of fhe ST.

 

I know you liked TFA and I agree it had a lot of good ideas in it, it (mostly) looked great, but you've gotta admit that it fails when it comes to playing in the same sandbox as its predecessor. If you give that no importance, fine, but personally I think that's pretty important.

I don't give that no importance. I disagree that he didn't "play in the same sandbox". The movie, as far as its major storylines go, went pretty much exactly how I thought it would based on my viewings of TFA.

 

Ive said this before but I guess my idea of what should happen next just meshed with Johnson's. Im not saying anyone who thought different is necessarily wrong. Same thing happened when I listened to summaries of the Trevorrow draft. I was actually working on like a "my version of Episode IX" and I stopped cause it was so damn similar to what Trevorrow did. Me writing one myself became an even bigger waste of time than it would have been in the first place.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I just think Phasma is like realistically the 4th most important bad guy in TFA, its not often #4 villains get these large expanded roles going forward. I was on this board alot between TFA and TLJ and there was a lot of speculation about alot of characters. Im not sure I remember anyone ever really speculating about her going into it. No one really cared.

I get that. I just look at it the same way as Nute Gunray. He got the ball rolling for the PT. His invasion of Naboo is the spark to Sidious' plot to take power. And then just when we thought Gunray was done at the end of TPM, we find out he's still in full control of his trade federation at the start of AOTC, still using his power and money to influence galactic events, and it continues that way the rest of the trilogy. Then at the end of ROTS when Gunray finally gets killed by orders of the very same Sidious no less, we've come full circle. Gunray fired the first shot at the start of the first film and his death signaled the end of the war in the final film. It symbolized Sidious' plot to take control of the galaxy had come to fruition. We even get the juxtaposition of Obi Wan and Yoda walking through the dead bodies at the Jedi Temple cut with the scene of Anakin slaughtering the Separatist leaders to show that both sides have been eliminated. Even though Gunray is "the 4th most important bad guy" just to quote your words and could've just disappeared after TPM, there was still a sense of finality and closure when he was there at the end. And this is Gunray we're taking about. Phasma is a much more interesting character and could've had a better storyline woven through the ST as has been suggested in this thread.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

 

I just think Phasma is like realistically the 4th most important bad guy in TFA, its not often #4 villains get these large expanded roles going forward. I was on this board alot between TFA and TLJ and there was a lot of speculation about alot of characters. Im not sure I remember anyone ever really speculating about her going into it. No one really cared.

I get that. I just look at it the same way as Nute Gunray. He got the ball rolling for the PT. His invasion of Naboo is the spark to Sidious plot to take power. And then just when we thought Gunray was done at the end of TPM, we find out hes still in full control of his trade federation at the start of AOTC, still using his power and money to influence galactic events, and it continues that way the rest of the trilogy. Then at the end of ROTS when Gunray finally gets killed by orders of the very same Sidious no less, weve come full circle. Gunray fired the first shot at the start of the first film and his death signaled the end of the war in the final film. It symbolized Sidious plot to take control of the galaxy had come to fruition. We even get the juxtaposition of Obi Wan and Yoda walking through the dead bodies at the Jedi Temple cut with the scene of Anakin slaughtering the Separatist leaders to show that both sides have been eliminated. Even though Gunray is the 4th most important bad guy just to quote your words and couldve just disappeared after TPM, there was still a sense of finality and closure when he was there at the end. And this is Gunray were taking about. Phasma is a much more interesting character and couldve had a better storyline woven through the ST as has been suggested in this thread.

 

In all seriousness, what is interesting about her?

 

The fact is that the only reason the character even exists is because they liked the design of the costume which was early concept art for Kylo. They didn't feel it was right for him but thought it was cool enough to get into the movie. This wasn't some important character with an integral part of the movie. She is there literally cause she looks cool. Thats how JJ works. He takes things that he thinks are cool and jams them into his story.

 

Its like Lando in this movie. JJ was gonna put him in the movie no matter what. He was gonna be in there, they were gonna find a way. Johnson don't work that way. He said he wanted Lando in VIII but couldn't think of a great way to incorporate him. So he stuck to the story and focused on what he felt was important.

 

He obviously didn't feel Phasma was that important and considering her existance is simply because they had a cool idea for armor that was going unused I'd say he is probably right.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

The constant thing I hear everywhere is that Rian didn't follow through on the ideas that JJ introduced in Force Awakens and screwed the flow of the ST as a result. The main issue really is that is JJ introduced a lot of these threads without any idea where they were going in the first place. So yeah, Rian did do the "unexpected" but there was no expectation of where it was ever going in the first place. Rian had no roadmap to work towards, not because he ignored but because there wasn't one in the first place.

 

I agree that the blame ultimately falls at Kathleen Kennedy but JJ did not need to do any course correction with ROS because there was no course to correct. At some point they decided to throw away the Lucas treatments (for better or worse) that presumably did have some idea in place and they went with the guy who is KNOWN for mystery box type stories with no predetermined story. Maybe if they'd gone with someone else to kick start of the series, they would have had some idea of where it's all going to go and we'd have an actual story throughout.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I feel like alot of times in these kind of movies there are early concepts that don't make it into the movie. Sometimes these concepts are even really cool but they get pushed aside because they don't fit/work in the story. I seems like even when something that really fit into his story that JJ just uses these concepts anyway. Look at even the Knights of Ren. Cool idea. Kylo has these underlings who all look badass. But lets face it, they don;t do anything in TFA. Snoke mentions it once and they are shown for a couple seconds in flashback. JJ didn't have any idea for what they actually did. I don't believe for one second he had some great idea he was holding in his back pocket. I think he believed the name sounded cool and they looked cool so he got them in.

 

Same thing with Phasma, I don't believe JJ had some great idea. I think he believed the concept art looked cool. Look at what she does in the movie. AFter the opening attack is over Kylo gives an order to kill the prisoners, she then gives her men that order. She reprimands Finn for taking his helmet off and says to turn his blaster in. SHe looks at a baby pic of Finn and tells Hux his number. She then is taken out with no effort by Chewie and then thrown in a trash compactor off screen. She does nothing important and is not interesting in the least. JJ just thought she looked cool.

 

Now Im not saying she couldn't have had a cool role going forward, ofcourse she could have. Im not saying there is anything wrong with a fan wanting to have seen more of her and being disappointed they didn't. The issue I have is that fans just cant say "man Phasma looked cool I wish she was there more." They have to add the extra bit to justify their opinon of "JJ set it up and Rian ignored it". If thats the case then why did no one complain about Maz's role in TLJ? She has a far more important role than Phasma in TFA and then is just a quick cameo in TLJ. I don't remember any complaints about that? Why? because its about Rian not following up on JJ, its about Phasma looked cool. There is nothing wrong with a fan wanting more of Phasma and not of Maz but don't make it out like its about some deep story issues and Rian not following up. Because if it was then you'd be complaining about Maz's lack of time in TLJ just as much.

 

As for my earlier take that JJ just puts cool things into movies even if he doesnt know how to use them. I don't think thats a bad approach in general, nothing wrong with having cool looking things in the movies! However when you have a fanbase that is going to parse every word and detail and speculate on every single aspect of your movie the fans make it a problem. The fact is there is nothing wrong with a character having a larger role in one movie and then a smaller role in the next movie or vice versa.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Its not like Phasma has some cool role in TFA. She really doesn't do anything. At the end she is taken down in like a comic relief kinda way. During the attack on Maz's castle she isn't even there. When Finn fights a trooper 1 on 1 during that battle its not Phasma. I mean to say Rian ignored Phasma ignores the fact that JJ pretty much ignores here too. She has nothing even approaching an action scene in TFA. She does more in TLJ than TFA, even if her actions are all condensed to a sequence or two.

 

In reality you are making my point for me when you say JJ created a fake Emperor then when Rian killed him off JJ just brought back the original. It shows a lack of originality and imagination. I mean its almost like JJ thought "oh wow how can someone possibly make a Star Wars movie without an old guy sitting on a throne and without blowing up a planet???"

Actually now that I think of it what if Hux and Phasma were upset about the way the story was getting written? I mean having Hux be the traitor was a lame "oops" explain this away really quick thing. But I think there were more that might have been unhappy. They just needed a good committee meeting with a force choke. Just throwing this out really quick between class bells.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

 Share

×
×
  • Create New...

Important Information

By using this site, you agree to our Terms of Use.